Remolded Future
by OmnipotentSquib
Summary: AU. After a Pyrrhic victory in the Battle of Hogwarts, Harry finds an ancient book in the Black Library with instructions on how to send his memories back into the past. Something goes wrong, though, as the eighteen-year old ends up there body and all.
1. Oh crap

When the spinning finally subsided, Harry found himself in the middle of a lush field. It was a sunny day and the clouds were merrily rolling overhead, which was quite a change from the drab overcasts that plagued Britain during the dementors' breeding spree. As he finished inspecting the surroundings, he already knew something was wrong. He was just sending his memories back in time, wasn't he? That should not transport him anywhere _physically_. He also knew he wasn't actually his younger self, as his body seemed much the same as when he started the ritual - hands and legs looked to be about the same size and, furthermore, he was still wearing the same clothes. His musing was interrupted by the sound of the door being slammed shut behind him. He whirled around and almost did a double take as he finally discovered where he ended up - right in front of the Burrow, just past the garden boundary where the gnomes landed after being thrown out of it. He eventually tore his eyes away from the house itself and looked down at the people that came out of the house.

Standing right in front of the garden wall were the twins - Fred and George, and one of his best friends - Ron. They were all curiously looking straight at him and muttering amongst themselves. He quickly noticed that Ron looked younger - way younger - than he used to. He looked more like he did in their first year. Same went for the twins. At first, in a rush of incoming emotions and memories, he was about to run over and violently hug them, but then he remembered that he still looked as if he was about to graduate. He quickly realized that instead of just his memories being sent back here, he got plopped in whole, body and all. That wasn't supposed to happen! Blood drained out of his face and he tried not to panic, which was a lot harder when he realized he had to start acting fast before the trio behind the garden wall came to investigate.

Harry whirled around once more, and started to slowly walk away, as if he was just another perfectly normal stranger that perfectly normally ended up in a meadow right in front of someone's house and perfectly normally stared at it for a few minutes. His breathing speeded up when he heard the sound of footsteps hurrying to catch up with him. He was about to break into a full-blown run, when he heard the sound of his pre-adolescent best mate's voice.

"Hey, wait up!" - shouted Ron, and Harry was a hair away from disapparating right then and there as far as he possibly could, but he hesitantly turned around his breath hitched when he saw his almost-family up close. The approaching trio's eyes widened and Harry knew right there and then that he should have taken the disapparation route.

"H-Harry?!" - asked one of the twins, and he wasn't really in the mood to discern which one of them it was right that second. Deciding to play the ignorance card for the moment, he tried to smile, which quickly turned into a pained grimace.

"Er, Harry? What Harry?" - he choked out, trying to sound convincing, which obviously he failed miserably at, as the twins quickly countered -

\- "Potter. You know.",

\- "The Boy-Who-Lived...",

\- "Seeker extraordinaire...",

\- "Defeater of stuttering professors...",

\- "Receiver of the Grand Toilet Seat award...",

\- "He's kind of famous.",

\- "Yeah. Just a bit."

The time-traveller wasn't extremely happy with the list of achievements they were assigning him right now, though it did reveal that this was likely the summer after the first year, which would be right around when Harry's memories were supposed to end up. Making a mental note to think about this more later, he quickly responded, in the same unconvincing voice and with a really bad attempt at a grin.

"Ah, er, no. I get that a lot, you see, lots of people tell me I look like a Potter. My name is..." - and he stumbled in his speech right there, because, obviously, he didn't have a name prepared for this occasion. "...D-Daniel Bl-White." - he finally stuttered out. He felt himself blush. This was a tragedy.

"Well, "Daniel", is that why you've carved yourself that scar on your forehead?" - he was asked by Ron, who was clearly disbelieving and looking at him through narrowed eyes. Harry winced. Of course. That blasted, bloody scar was doing him in again! He stared like a deer caught in headlights, thinking up possible responses to this, all of which unfortunately involved silly things like _"Yeah, I'm his biggest fan!"_ and even the Dursley version of the truth about being involved in a car crash. After what seemed like eternity to HIM, let alone to the inquisitive trio, he just sighed and put his head down. It was over. There was no escape. Nothing he could've said after that horrible start could convince even a particularly dumb troll. He briefly considered obliviating them, but he wasn't sure how to do it, and didn't want to do it to them anyway.

"Bloody hell, Harry, is that really you?" - Ron queried, and Harry, resigned to his fate, just nodded. He just waited for the questions which should be starting right abou...

\- "Ickle Harrykins, would you perhaps mind telling us..." - began the first of the twins,

\- "...how you managed to make yourself look..." - added the second,

\- "...older than our esteemed Perfect Prefect the Percival the Great?" - finished the first, and the duo grinned at each other.

There was another brief bout of silence, as Harry tried to formulate something that didn't involve time travel, but he started feeling faint and decided it wasn't going to work anyway, so he just shrugged, whilst still having his head down.

"Hey, Dad said you got an underage magic warning a few days ago. Was it some failed spell?"

Harry thought the spell responsible for this situation worked perhaps a tad bit too well, but he just remained quiet.

"No, Ronniekins, that was a hover charm, remember? This must be...",

"...a potion! Did you try to practice to get better grades from the dungeon bat...?"

Harry just snorted here, as no matter what he did in that class, Snape would always have to behave like he loathed him, being a spy and all. Not that he didn't actually loathe him, of course. The trio just took his reaction as a denial and started speculating again.

"I know!" - grinned the left twin, "He's a time traveller!" - and Harry involuntarily quickly raised his head a bit. After inwardly groaning, he congratulated himself on spilling that particular secret, too. Meanwhile, the trio obviously noticed his reaction and widened their eyes.

"Oh wow, really? I was only joking!" - piped up the left twin just as Ron almost shouted,

"Bloody hell, you're from the future?!"

Harry finally looked up fully to see the three looking at him in awe, expecting goodness-knows-what to happen, when he felt he really needed to sit, before his legs just give out, and did so in the fluffy grass. He put his head in his and quietly muttered, "It wasn't supposed to go like this..."

Fred, George and Ron exchanged worried glances at each other and after a moment or two, both twins started to pull Harry up from the ground.

"Come on, let's get you inside..."

Harry considered this and decided it was best to comply, as with how his luck usually went, he was bound to be found in that field by Rita Skeeter, Dumbledore, Fudge and Voldemort at the same time any second now. Besides, since the cat was out of the bag anyway, he figured he would need some help, and his almost-family would surely at least hear him out. He got up and, head low, followed Ron, while being followed by the twins, into the house.

* * *

As they entered, they heard Mrs. Weasley shout out.

"Are you done already? I find that frankly hard to believe...",

"Mum, look who we found!" - shouted one of the twins right back, and Molly Weasley was in the room in an instant, seemingly furious.

"Fred, George, what did I tell you about inviting... stran... gers... ?"

Here Harry chanced a look at her and found her staring, mouth slightly open. She seemed to compose herself rather quickly, however.

"Harry? Dear, what happened to you?" She moved closer and lead him to the one of the kitchen chairs, which he gladly sat in, feeling faint again. She started fussing about, inspecting his face, which he got confused about, until he realized he would probably still be sporting all the scars and bruises he got during the final battle and the camping trip from hell. Bloody brilliant. When it looked like he wasn't going to start talking, and he had no intention to at the moment, as he felt a weird lump in his throat seeing his not-quite-mother concerned about him again, Mrs. Weasley turned to her children for an explanation.

\- "Well, we just found someone looking at the house from the gnome landing site...",

\- "...and then Ron suggested he looked like Harry. Then the stranger started to walk away, so...",

\- "...we rushed over. He tried to deny he's him, but we got there in the end."

Molly didn't look very happy at the concept of her children running to inspect a potentially dangerous stranger that was staring at their house, but given the subject matter, she let it slide. She finally let his face go and moved closer to them.

"Well, all right, but what about..." - and she made a waving gesture at the eighteen-year old, obviously intending to ask about his appearance. This time, it was Ron who piped up.

"That's the strangest part! We think he's from the future... he reacted when Fred mentioned that...". Hearing this, Mrs. Weasley frowned.

"Oh, nonsense! You can't go back in time this far, all the ministry's been able to achieve for years is a few hours at best..." - she scoffed. Harry looked up at her with tired eyes and at the look he was sporting, she gasped.

"You mean... But how?" She sat down at a chair next to his, looking quite worried and the others sat down around the kitchen table as well. Harry supposed it was time to start explaining if he had to have any hopes at fulfilling what he tried to come back in time for.

"W-well..." - he started, in a slightly hoarse voice, before he cleared his throat - "...it really wasn't supposed to be like this...", he repeated his own words from five minutes ago, before sighing and continuing when the rest just kept staring. "All I tried to do was send my memories back as far as I could to my younger self. I didn't think I'd actually, er, get sent back whole."

"But, dear, why would you do such a thing?" - asked Mrs. Weasley - "And how? Was this method something that was discovered in the future?"

"Ah, um, well. I don't think so. It was a ritual from a fairly old book, you see."

Molly gasped and started to glare.

"Harry James Potter! Did you know how dangerous rituals are? And most of them are illegal and dark! How could anyone let you do such a thing?!" It wasn't quite the full-blown howler scream yet, but Molly was already getting there. Harry flinched and bowed his head again.

In a flat voice, he responded - "Well, I did it because there was no one to stop me. And illegality? The ministry was pretty much gone at that point, anyway" - he shrugged. This seemed to give Molly pause in her increasing rage, as her next words were much softer.

"What do you mean "no one to stop you"?" - she asked, while obviously starting to get the picture.

"Just what I said. There was no one. Almost everyone that would actually care was dead." - the four assembled sucked in their breaths at that - "Voldemort" - and at this they violently flinched - "was resurrected. After the ministry denied he was back, he gathered up allies and when it was finally revealed he was truly back, there was little anyone could do to stop him from steamrolling Britain like he pleased." Harry looked around. They looked terrified. He sighed.

"So, uh, while I did eventually manage to beat Voldemort," - again, flinch - "a big portion of his allies were still around, while our side was reduced to almost nothing." He bowed his head again, briefly reminiscing about when the reports regarding who lived through the final bout started rolling in. He soon found himself pretty much alone in the world, with no friendly face to turn to. Meanwhile, the Weasleys continued to stay speechless, so after a moment, he resumed.

"Even with Voldemort dead, his Death Eaters rather quickly regrouped and I had to hole myself up somewhere safe." He winced here slightly, as Grimmauld Place 12 wasn't exactly top security at that point, having been pretty much compromised after the adventure in the ministry. However, Harry knew Yaxley, the Death Eater which followed them in there, was dead by that time, and if he understood the Fidelius Charm right, while Yaxley could lead other Death Eaters into the place by hand, he couldn't have actually revealed the location to them as he wasn't one of the secret keepers. This meant that Harry was the only one person left in the world who knew about the place - at least, he thought so. Besides, it was the only option left. He wasn't disturbed during his stay there, so he figured he has been right, but he dreaded a knock on the door every day.

"So while I was there, I spent my free... well, pretty much all the time reading." The Black Library was pretty much the only source of entertainment at the dreary place anyway, bar having shout matches with Walburga Black or discussions with Kreacher. The elf had become decent and stopped muttering incessantly after fulfilling his last master's wish, but he wasn't the most interesting soul to talk to. He did appreciate the elf, as he was his only way to acquire food without risking his own life, but Kreacher's favourite topic of conversation still seemed to be "ways to torture muggles".

"I wasn't hoping to find anything in particular. To be honest, I was quite resigned to my fate at that point... But then..." - Harry looked around again, and this time he noticed Mrs. Weasley was holding back tears. He needed to get this over with quickly. "...Well, I found the book I talked about. When I read what the ritual would do, I imagined my younger self would go to Dumbledore and with the knowledge of the future, the timeline would be changed... So, I went ahead with it. The ritual wasn't difficult to perform, or so it seemed, but... I guess I must've botched something up."

Harry shrugged. "When I arrived here and noticed that the whole thing went wrong, I tried to get away unnoticed, but they already spotted me. And I'm apparently completely unable to make up a story on the spot." He smiled sheepishly, trying to get them to calm down, at least slightly. Ron regained his voice at this point.

"Um... Harry... When you say everyone was dead..." - he gulped, "...do you mean, er, us, too?"

Harry looked away from him and after a second or so, nodded. Good job calming them down, he mentally told himself, but he knew he had to be honest. It wouldn't do to sugar-coat the situation.

"Yes, Ron, when I say everyone, I really do mean everyone. You, Hermione, all your brothers, your parents, Dumbledore, Remus, Sir..." - he stopped there, it wouldn't do to mention his godfather so willy-nilly, even if they wouldn't necessarily connect that name with the supposed mass-murderer. "...er, yes. Everyone." - he finished lamely.

At that point, Molly got out of her seat and moved towards her children. She made no comment, just enveloped them in a hug one by one, eventually including him as well. Harry felt rather awkward being hugged by this woman he knew pretty well, yet which didn't know him pretty much at all at this point in time. He saw her sob a little and remembered what was her boggart; the bodies of her dead children. He knew this would hit her hard, and felt pretty bad, but once again, it wouldn't do to present the situation differently. He moved to comfort her.

"Mrs. Weasley, please. At this point, everything is OK. I tried to send my memories back to fix everything, after all."

Normally, Harry would probably be in an even worse state following the deaths of so many people he knew and loved. He did spend almost a month grieving over them. He once even was about to depart to Forbidden Forest to find the Resurrection Stone, so he could speak to them one last time, but that reminded him of what his parents told him when he used said Stone - to not grieve for the dead, for they are in a better place.

She eventually let go, and started to compose herself. After a while, Ron seemed to realize something and spoke again.

"Er, Harry? Say, you wouldn't happen to know why you're not responding to our mail at the moment?" Recalling this was probably right before second year, he looked at him and nodded, but didn't elaborate as he realized - of course! His younger self would still be at the Dursleys! Suddenly there was a noise and a small, red-haired, freckled girl stepped into the kitchen. She looked around, noticed Harry and briefly looked confused, before blushing and running away. The twins snickered slightly, but didn't comment as they still seemed quite rattled by the revelations Harry just dropped on them. Either way, this triggered a certain memory of this exact thing happening the day he came here.

He recalled that he, the twins and Ron were also made to de-gnome the garden. Was this a coincidence? He decided to ask.

"Ah, er... what is the date, precisely?"

The twins blinked and the one he deemed to be George, said, "4th of August 1992". It was Harry's turn to blink. His younger self should be here already.

"And, er, have you thought of bringing me here?" Everyone looked confused for a second, and Harry wished he phrased that question better, but eventually Mrs. Weasley said, in a slightly strangled voice, "We planned to visit you by Friday if you didn't respond by then".

"Oh" - started Harry, and turned to the twins again, "and, er, you didn't think to sneak out and bring him here using your father's flying car or anything like that?"

The twins looked at each other and then at Ron, and they all smirked slightly, before Fred spoke up, "Well, we were almost ready to depart this morning when..."

"...when their mother caught them in the act." said Mrs. Weasley, suddenly stern, "That's why they were sent to de-gnome the garden. Honestly! You could have crashed! You could have been seen! Did you even think of..." - but then she stopped, confused, "Harry, dear, why are you asking them this? Surely, you wouldn't want them to..."

Meanwhile, Harry was pondering this new information. While he sort of agreed driving a semi-illegal, half-working, Statute of Secrecy-breaking muggle vehicle all the way up to Surrey by two fourteen year olds and a twelve year old was not the best of ideas, he also knew that was how he finally escaped the Durzkaban that year. Furthermore, being essentially starved, he wasn't sure his younger self would even last until Friday.

What really filled him with dread, however, was the fact that this did not happen in his own timeline. The twins and Ron weren't ever caught in the act. If this fact was different, what else could be different? What if his younger self was in a worse state than he was at this point?

Did he not actually go back in time, but landed in some other universe altogether? The rituals to do that were in that book, too. Did he get them confused?

While he was panicking himself into quite a state, the Weasleys looked at him, worried. No one moved for a few moments until Harry got up, walked back, spun on his heel and loudly disapparated, leaving the Weasleys speechless once again.

[ **Author's note:** Hello. It's possible you noticed this story go up a few days ago, just to be taken back down. The reason for this was that after thinking some more about one of the details, I decided it would make things rather awkward later on. The change isn't big, but you likely noticed it.]


	2. This was a bad idea

While the older Harry was finishing explaining himself to the Weasleys, younger Harry was laying on his bed in the smallest bedroom of Privet Drive No. 4. He was waiting for today's meagre food "ration".

While Harry has spent longer periods with restricted food in the cupboard just last year, he always could sneak out at night to swipe something more to eat. Right now, the door sported several intimidating locks, so leaving wasn't an option. Thus, on his fifth day of starvation, he was seriously doubting if he'll even make it to Hogwarts before keeling over. He idly thought that if he ever DID made it back there, he'd have to start eating more in case this ever happened again; at least then he'd have reserves to rely on.

As he was imagining himself returning as fat as Dudley the next year just to survive his holiday break, suddenly, a loud popping noise erupted from the middle of his room and Harry saw someone's legs out the corner of his eye.

Hedwig squawked and Harry was on his feet in an instant, just to abruptly sit back down on the bed when he noticed the face of the person who decided to invade his "private" space.

As Older Harry started apparating into the room, he silently cursed himself. What the heck was he doing? He was rushing into action, headfirst, like a thoughtless Gryffindor, once again. Didn't Hermione warn him repeatedly not to meet your younger self during time travel? And besides, how could he possibly explain himself to himself?

However, the nagging feeling something could be wrong could not be squelched and he just had to check and make sure. It wouldn't do to travel back in time just to discover his younger self has died or something. And besides, if that happened, wouldn't he drop dead or disappear, as well?

As he landed in the room which he reluctantly called home during the summers, he winced at the sound his apparation made. He could do it more quietly, but that required more focus. In his barely formed resolve to check on himself, the jump was made quite carelessly and thus, quite loudly. The sound startled the boy laying on the bed and his owl, and he jumped up and onto his feet immediately. Their gazes locked, one worried and surprised, the other concerned. After a second, the younger boy had to sit down. Older Harry used this moment of confusion to inspect his other self.

Merlin, he was tiny back then. Ron seemed absolutely miniscule right now, but he was at least a few inches taller than himself. Harry was sure he could still easily pass as a relatively small first year. He silently cursed his caretakers as he took in the boy's apparent weight; he remembered this was the worst summer food-wise and it certainly showed. But then, Older Harry released a breath he didn't know he was holding; his other self wasn't beaten into a pulp or anything like that. He just had to get him out of here and hand over to Molly. A plan of action already started forming. Yes. Maybe this would all work out after all. While it was quite weird to look at himself from the third person, as it were, he didn't feel some inexplicable urge to attack or other things Hermione seemed to suggest might happen were this ever to occur.

Younger Harry looked scared and shocked at first, but now was clearly starting to get confused, probably since the "invader" seemed to relax after looking at him. Seeing his twelve-year-old self wasn't about to start the conversation, he did it instead.

"Er... hi." - he began, articulate as ever, just to be interrupted.

"Who are you and how did you get into my room?" - squeaked out his other self, after clearly gathering up all his bravery. "And why do you look like-" - he didn't get to finish that question, as the duo heard a sound as if an elephant was trying to run up the staircase leading up to the first storey. They both correctly assessed said elephant to likely be Uncle Vernon, which was promptly confirmed when said individual started cursing out loud as he tried to figure out which key went to which of the locks placed on the door. It seemed that Older Harry's "graceful" entrance has perhaps been heard downstairs. And in the entire neighbourhood.

Once again congratulating himself on his apparently immeasurable stupidity, Older Harry started pulling out his wand, just to be stopped by his younger self's pleading voice.

"No! You can't, please! I've already got a warning earlier this summer and if you use magic around here, they'll expel me!" - he almost shouted and it was clear the boy was panicked. Older Harry didn't blame him, seeing how he knew exactly how they both got that warning, so he put his best reassuring smile on (well, one he thought it was reassuring, anyway) and said, "Don't worry. It doesn't work like that. I promise."

He actually didn't know that, as no one ever explained how precisely the trace worked, but was fairly sure of it. After all, the Order of the Phoenix were free to use magic around his house all they wanted when they came here, and he knew the ministry wasn't alerted then since Moody would likely not allow such a blatant security hole. Besides, he didn't really plan on using magic, anyway. Uncle Vernon was a big brute, but the second he got faced with equal opposition, he became quite cowardly.

Younger Harry didn't seem especially convinced and was probably about to protest and tell him all the details of Dobby's little cake incident, when the door finally swung open, knocking over yesterday's can of soup that stood next to the cat flap it was delivered through, revealing the puce-coloured face of their walrus uncle. He looked like he was gathering enough air in his lungs to spew some of the usual verbal diarrhoea, likely containing an overabundance of the word "freak" and variations thereof at absurdly loud volume. However, that was when he noticed the older person in the room.

"Wh... Who are you?! What are you doing in my house?!" - he bellowed, but looked startled and his face lost almost all colour as he noticed the piece of wood the stranger bore in his hand. Harry quickly composed himself and tried to appear carefree and calm.

"A friend of Harry's. I've come to take him away for the rest of the summer." His younger self looked like the pure definition of confusion. Before his counterpart could ruin his story, he kneeled in front of him and looked him straight in the eyes and whispered.

"Look, I know you're confused, but trust me. We'll go to the Weasleys and I'll explain everything". He smiled slightly when he noticed Younger Harry's gaze wander over to his forehead and saw a small gasp and widening of the eyes. He almost snorted at the irony of Harry Potter staring at Harry Potter's scar, before he continued, louder this time.

"So your things are in your cupboard?" This seemingly innocent statement was just supposed to further along the thoughts that were already forming inside the twelve-year olds' head. After all, no one was supposed to know about "his" cupboard. After a second or so, he saw himself nod hesitantly. Success!

"Is the cupboard locked?" Another nod. He knew this already, but appearances should be kept. Adult Harry got up and walked over to his uncle.

"Well then, Mr. Dursley, I'll require the key to said cupboard, we'll take his trunk and be on our way." He smiled. The man still seemed stunned by the sudden appearance of a fully qualified wizard in his house and didn't even protest when Harry reached his hand towards the bundle of keys he was holding. Then, Harry motioned to his younger self.

"Well, grab your owl and come, then." - he said, put the wand back into his sleeve and started to head down the stairs.

Meanwhile, Young Harry was weighing his options, still not quite sure he could trust... himself? One look at his uncle, however, who was slowly returning from his stupor back to being furious made up his mind. If he didn't leave right now, he'd probably skin him alive. So, he quickly picked up his owl's cage and bolted from the room that contained nothing else worthwhile downstairs. There, his older lookalike was already in the process of unlocking the cupboard. That was when Aunt Petunia rolled onto the scene. It seemed Dudley was out of the house.

"Ah, Mrs. Dursley, it's lovely to see you. I'll be taking your nephew for the rest of the summer." She seemed to be about as stunned as Vernon at first, but composed herself much quicker.

"Who are you? You're clearly related to him, so why isn't he staying with you?" she spat. That was when the sound of an elephant trudging down the stairs was heard and uncle Vernon, who finally regained his favourite skin tone, appeared.

"Yeah, precisely! We were told he had no other relatives to go to! Why do we have to take care of the freak if another freak like you could be doing the job?" It appeared that Vernon took note of the polite, pleasant tone that was used so far and decided that the trespasser was someone he could easily bully into submission, wizard or not. Older Harry was just taking out the trunk out of the cupboard, but he stopped, looked thoughtful for a second and addressed both Dursleys. He had an idea.

"There were circumstances that prevented me from doing so. Perhaps now the situation is, ah, rectified..." - there he looked at Younger Harry - "...but for now I can only promise he won't be returning for the rest of the summer." He really wanted to tell his younger self right then and there that he never had to return here again, but he didn't want to instil false hope. There were several factors that could prevent that from happening.

Older Harry finished taking everything out of the cupboard, including the Nimbus 2000, (which he briefly looked at with sadness, remembering its' final fate in his own timeline, before stuffing it into the trunk), shut the door and threw the keys back to Vernon, who almost failed catching them.

"We don't want him here! He ruined a wonderful business opportunity just last week his freakishness!" - he roared - "He didn't even get punished in any way! And that lousy warning just made things worse!"

Adult Harry's gaze suddenly turned steel and Younger Harry was impressed - that was the sort of glare Snape gave to unruly dunderheads. Vernon recoiled back, when he saw him twitching his hand toward the wand again.

"Oh, indeed? So locking him in from outside and feeding through a cat flap was just an experiment, not his punishment, then?"

"Lies! All lies! That boy always tells made up stories to get out of trouble!" shrieked Aunt Petunia, but the time-traveller just smiled.

"Ah, is that why his door took a full minute to open and there was a can of soup next to the flap, then?" Petunia looked like she swallowed a truck-full of lemons and before the conflict could escalate further, he regained his pleasant look and turned to his younger self.

"Well, I think we shall excuse ourselves. Come on, Harry." He grabbed the trunk by its' handle and opened the door. He motioned him to go out. He was about to step out, when an idea hit him. This wouldn't be strictly necessary, but if his younger self had to return here, it'd make his life a bit easier next time." Ah, Mr. Dursley? Grunt. "You should know that while it was initially thought it was Harry doing magic in here, further investigation revealed that not to be the case. So... it truly wasn't his fault at all."

The Dursleys both looked startled before Vernon bellowed "Well, who the bloody hell could it be, then?!"

Older Harry smirked. "I truly have no idea. Perhaps someone else in your family is also magical? After all, Mrs. Dursley's sister was a witch. Maybe she wanted that cake served so much it just happened." Petunia's eye started twitching and Harry knew it was time to bolt. "Either way, farewell." He pushed the door closed and immediately heard panicked whispering behind it, which make him chuckle. He walked toward his younger self.

"Let Hedwig out. I'm sure she'll enjoy a wing-stretcher and she'll know where we end up. Here." He held out a small key to the padlock on the cage. "Nicked this off that key-chain." Young Harry quickly grabbed the key, and as soon as he unlocked the door to the cage, Hedwig flew away, not even awaiting any instructions. "Let's go then," said Older Harry and gently steered his younger self in the same direction Dumbledore led him before his sixth year. He chanced a look at the boy and was sure he was exploding with curiosity. He waited for when said curiosity would win against the hesitancy to speak out, and knowing himself pretty well, he figured it wouldn't take more than ten steps. It took eight in the end.

"Er." - started the twelve year old and seeing an encouraging nod continued - "Uh, are you, er, me?" The eighteen year old chuckled at the bluntness of the question. He would prefer to answer everything at the Burrow, away from giraffe-necked gossip gatherers of Privet Drive, but he knew this question must be eating his younger self from inside. Still, to prevent a rush of questions right here, he decided to stretch out his answer to that one a bit. Less chance of anyone figuring out what they were talking about, as well.

\- "Well, what do you think?"

\- "You could just be tricking me. I'm sure there's some way to change how one looks magically" said his younger self, narrowed his gaze and slowed his steps a little. "But you did know about the cupboard and that it wasn't me who did magic a couple days ago..." He bit his lip. Then, his eyes widened and he stopped.

"Wait, did you just suggest Aunt Petunia is magical? That wasn't her! It was a house-elf!" his voice got raised a little, and Older Harry had to shush him before looking around, but he didn't think anyone heard.

"Look, I know. I only said that so that if you have to return here after all, you won't get any more flak from them for that." Young Harry looked terrified and the time-traveller knew what he was about to say.

"No, instead they'll be convinced I somehow passed on the "disease" to them." His response was a snort.

"Relax, I know exactly how they operate. I lived with them for long enough. They'll be so scared by the mere suggestion, they'll actually just convince themselves the whole thing didn't happen and never mention it again. I guarantee it."

Young Harry looked thoughtful and finally conceded the point. "So, uh, that answers my first question then? You really are me?" Older Harry nodded and they resumed walking.

"As for how it this is possible, you'll have to wait until we are at the Weasley's." In response to that the smaller boy frowned before he eventually blurted out, "Er... is time travel possible with magic?" The time-traveller sighed.

\- "That obvious, then, huh?",

\- "Well, what else it could be?",

\- "...A few things, actually, believe it or not. But you hit the nail on the head the first time."

While the time traveller had a feeling convincing his younger self went far too easy, he was glad he managed it. He'd just have to be taught to be more vigilant later. They walked for a while in silence when Young Harry decided to ask his next question.

\- "Er, how far do the Weasleys live? How are we getting there? Not by walking, right?",

\- "'Course not. Getting by foot to Devon would be rather tiring.",

\- "So, then?",

\- "We'll apparate. We just have to get somewhere where no one will see us.",

\- "Apparate?"

Older Harry suppressed a sigh. It was easy to forget how ignorant he was back then.

\- "Think of it like teleportation." - Young Harry suddenly looked intrigued - "It's not the most pleasant way to travel, but certainly the quickest and most convenient."

\- "But I can't do magic...",

\- "Even if you could, it's normally taught in sixth year, so I rather doubt you'd be able to pull it off right now. Even if you did end up on that school chimney once." - he winked and then chuckled at his younger selves' look of realization on his face. Learning something in Hogwarts that he could connect with a piece of accidental magic he did when young were always his favourite moments.

"Anyhow, no, I'll just take you along. That's called side-apparation." Conveniently, they just arrived at the secluded area Harry intended to serve as the apparition point. He steered his younger self towards it and spoke once again.

"Grab my hand tightly and don't let go. As I said, it's not the most pleasant feeling, but it'll pass quickly. You may feel nauseous after, though. Lots of people vomit on their first try, though I doubt you had enough food to do so. Just warning you, though." His younger self nodded and a crack later the two Harry Potters left Surrey.


	3. Well, what now?

"Where do you think he went?" asked Ron, starting to get worried. It's been at least thirty minutes and the adult Harry Potter was still not back at the Burrow after his dramatic exit.

Following the initial bout of silence, the Burrow's kitchen exploded with questions and speculation of what got their visitor so worried. They eventually decided it must've been something to do with his younger self, though they couldn't imagine what the date had to do with that. So, they waited for him to get back.

"Ickle Ronniekins, in case you failed to notice..." - answered Fred in a bored tone,

"...we've been in this room with you since he left..." - continued George,

"...and unless we both managed to miss some important clue...",

"...we know as much as you do."

Ron huffed slightly, when a tell-tale crack of apparition resounded and two male figures appeared in the small cramped kitchen of Ottery St Catchpole's most eccentric building. The smaller one immediately bent down, clutched his stomach and started to gasp for air. The taller one moved closer to help the other one stand.

\- "You okay?",

\- "That... was worse... than I imagined... it would be."

The older Harry Potter nodded and added sympathetically,

"Unfortunately, the other magical methods of transport don't really agree with me either. Apparition does get tolerable eventually. I always most preferred brooms, though." The younger Potter took in a final, deep breath and fully stood up.

\- "Aw, look, George...",

\- "...those two... Just like a parent and a child, am I right, Fred?",

\- "Yes, truly stunning. Just like a mother and her son..."

Both Harries rolled their eyes in eerily similar ways.

\- "Whoa, that's just... creepy" - commented Ron, who just got done staring back and forth between the two.

\- "What is?" - Arthur Weasley entered the kitchen, looking rather cheerful. He stopped when he took in the obvious unusual sight, blinked repeatedly and spent the next minute staring back and forth. Eerily similar to how Ron has.

\- "Oh, Arthur!" - Molly Weasley made her way towards her husband and enveloped him in a hug. She looked to be barely holding back tears again.

\- "Er, has something... happened?" - the man looked suddenly worried and Mrs. Weasley nodded.

\- "If I may interject" - said the older Harry Potter - "technically nothing's really happened yet. But it very well might."

Arthur Weasley looked back and forth between the two Potters once again.

\- "Ah, er, could I ask you two for..." - he began,

\- "Our names?" - Adult Harry raised an eyebrow. "Certainly. Me, I'm Harry Potter. And this here, is Harry Potter."

The twins snorted, but Mr. Weasley didn't seem quite so amused. He didn't really look like he knew to react to that revelation and Harry silently blessed the fact there was no war going on right now; he'd probably be getting hexed all the way back to Surrey right now, otherwise. He figured it was time to explain.

"Like I have already explained to your wife, Mr. Weasley, due to a unknown mishap I seem to have ended up back in time..." He laid more of the story out here, repeating what he already told the other Weasleys.

"So, uh, here we are." - he ended, smiling sheepishly. Mr. Weasley, which was mostly quiet during his explanation, bar some minor gasps and flinches when Voldemort's name was uttered, finally spoke.

"Er, as interesting as that tale is, you don't suppose you could prove this to us, somehow?" Ah. That's right. While the twins, Ron and Molly were keen to believe his every word from the start, he didn't exactly provide any proof. And providing evidence to support his story was actually slightly problematic, seeing how the family barely knew him right now. After a bit of thought, however, he did think of just the thing. Not wanting to get his younger mate's self into trouble, he moved over to whisper in his ear.

"In our first year, you were bitten by Hagrid's pet dragon, Norbert, which we then sent off to the reserve your brother works for in Romania."

That would probably be enough, but just to make sure, he continued.

"Also, around Christmas, we found the Mirror of Erised, in which you saw yourself winning the Quidditch Cup for Gryffindor and becoming the head boy."

There. Two facts Ron definitely didn't tell anyone else about.

"Well then?" - He asked openly - "Do you think I am who I claim I am?" The youngest male Weasley nodded.

"And another thing, I suppose" - Adult Harry continued - "I could just say that you helped me get through the King's Cross barrier when I didn't know how to get to Platform 9 3/4 on the first day of school." That wasn't the strongest proof, but it was the only thing he could think of to tell the entire family. Arthur seemed to want to ask his son what he was told that made him be convinced, but seeing him sit there slightly embarrassed made the man realize the information was somehow private.

"We... should inform Dumbledore about this." - the Weasley patriarch eventually breathed out. Everyone, including his younger self, nodded, while he just folded his arms. Ah, yes, Dumbledore. While still planning for the ritual, he did briefly think about telling (by writing and memorising a note) his younger self to avoid the manipulative headmaster, who, in his efforts to win the war, played everyone like chess pieces. He quickly realized, though, that he wasn't nearly cunning enough to go behind Dumbledore while also outsmarting Voldemort. Especially not when he was twelve.

So, the old man was definitely unavoidable. Doubly so, now. Oh well. He just hoped he would listen and not concoct another unlikely plan like last time.

"Yes, I suppose we should. However!" - and he pointed towards his younger self here - "He has to eat something, first."

This made the twelve-year-old blush.

"Uh, no, it's okay, really. This is far more important, from the sound of it. I, er, already ate."

Older Harry shot him an incredulous look. Of course, he guiltily realized, he did this sort of thing himself all the time. Claiming he's "fine" was almost his catchphrase during fifth year. Unfortunately, his counterpart was fighting a losing battle, here.

\- "Oh, you already ate? When exactly?",

\- "T-today, just before you came",

\- "And I suppose you forgot I know exactly what happened in that house?"

That prompted the younger Harry into stammering some weak excuses, but those were cut short by none other than Mrs. Weasley, which apparently just finished appraising him visually and didn't really like the verdict. So, she turned towards the older of the two.

"And what would that be, dear?"

His counterpart looked at him pleadingly, but he decided to be evil. He knew he would hate anyone that did this to him, but... Yes, perhaps spilling a few secrets would make himself grow up to be less scrawny. Plus, having the Weasley matriarch as an ally for when he was going to suggest to Dumbledore for Privet Drive to cease being the younger Potters' residence permanently could be useful.

"The reason I got so worked up and left in a hurry when you told me you didn't get him out of there yet was because I know I got barely any food since that ministry warning."

He saw himself slumping and blushing even more fiercely, if that was even possible. It was the turn of the Weasleys to look at them both incredulously.

"Ah, also, er, while he should eat, don't serve him an entire Hippogriff, as he won't be physically able to stomach it." was added after a moment.

Molly immediately got back to finishing the meal that was already cooking on the stove when he first entered the house with the twins and Ron, muttering something like _"horrible muggles_ " and _"how could that old man"._ Ah yes. An ally, indeed.

Ten minutes later he silently joined his younger self in hating himself, as Molly insisted he ingest a meal far bigger than that Hippogriff he so graciously saved the twelve-year from. He didn't notice the little brat smirking, either.

* * *

Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore was currently eating a meal in his office as well - using the Great Hall for that purpose in the summer would be silly, and since he had work pretty much all the time, he didn't bother going into his private quarters. As he was about to stab a nicely-looking piece of potato, the Floo chimed, signalling someone trying to visit. Being the Headmaster of Hogwarts, he had to keep the Floo open for any distressed parents or Ministers of Magic coming to solve a problem or eighty.

But, as he dropped his fork and approached the fireplace, he noticed that the head sticking out of it wasn't a parent or the bumbling Ministry official. Instead, Arabella Figg, the squib he sent to keep an eye out for Harry Potter while he was living with his relatives was looking at him with a worried expression.

"Arabella? Has something happened?"

"Several things, Albus, several things! Firstly, I didn't see Harry out of his house for almost a week now, and the Dursleys put bars on his window for whatever reason..."

Dumbledore frowned, hoping that wasn't an act of retaliation for the piece of magic Harry apparently performed a few days ago.

"Anyway, I was planning on asking Petunia to let me take the boy for a few hours today, but then I noticed him walking away from the house, alongside someone who I can only guess was pretending to be his father. Before I could get to them, they walked behind some bushes and poof! Gone! Probably disapparated."

Oh no. _Oh no! How_ _could have the blood wards failed so spectacularly?_ \- shrieked Dumbledore inside his own head as the severity of situation hit him fully and some of that panic spilled into his expression. He quickly composed himself, however, dismissed Arabella, and was just about ready to jump into action and start using all of his resources to track the gullible boy... when the Floo chimed again, blasted thing! Whirling around, he almost snapped something rude at Molly Weasley's head for bothering him in the moment of crisis, but he remembered that would not do. Instead, he tried to portray as much urgency in his voice as possible.

"Molly, I'm so sorry, but right now there's a problem concerning Harry Potter and I really can't..." - he started, but was interrupted.

"Of course there is! He has apparently been starved for the last five days!" - replied the incensed mother, glaring at the old man.

"Starv- you mean he's with you?"

As he heard the Weasley matriarch confirm, a wave of relief flooded Dumbledore's body, before he recalled something that gave him pause.

"Would you mind telling me who brought him in?" he asked, now curious. Surely, James Potter didn't...

"Ah, well, that's... a rather strange thing, really." What?! No, there's simply no way! The glare he was getting disappeared, and Molly was now looking to the side. "It'd be best if he explained himself, I suppose. Could you step thr..." Here a muffled voice was heard from the other side. "Oh, he says he'd rather do this in your office. Can he and Harry step through?"

Dumbledore nodded, mulling over who he was about to see. In a minute, the Floo flared green and Harry Potter fell out, landing face first on the floor and getting ash all over it. He was about to help the child up, when a second man was ejected out of the fireplace, in a similar manner as his predecessor, just barely stopping himself from kissing the ground as well.

The Potter hair on the older figure was unmistakable. After righting himself, he spoke. "Well, how did you enjoy that, then? Better than apparating?" The boy on the floor groaned, before turning himself over and getting up. "No? Didn't think so. Told you brooms are the best." There was a tone of amusement in his voice, and then he looked up to meet Dumbledore's eyes.

"Ah. Good morning, professor." He boy beside him nodded and mumbled a greeting as well.

The headmaster assessed the person standing in front of him. It wasn't James Potter. Anyone who knew the man would easily spot the differences. He was thinner and shorter than the man and a bit more battle-beaten. The green eyes were quickly spotted, along with the scar on the forehead and Dumbledore's breath hitched. Well. Wasn't that a sight. Subconsciously keeping his hand on his wand, he asked the obvious question.

"Good morning, Mr...?"

"Potter. Harry Potter. So nice to meet you, sir"

"Well, yes, that would appear to be so, perhaps, but I must say I can't say I expect that to be actually true" replied Dumbledore, wondering how precisely this person was expecting to get away with claiming such a thing. The Older Potter was about to reply, when Young Harry spoke up.

"He... is actually me, professor. Apparently from the future. He already told me some things no one else knows about..."

Dumbledore blinked and looked at Adult Harry in a new light before shaking his head.

"Alas, as much as I might trust Harry's judgement, I wonder if you would be willing to prove your identity in some more conclusive manner..."

Older Harry quickly gathered what Dumbledore was referring to. Of course the old man would immediately request Veritaserum testing for something like this. He didn't have anything to hide, but the idea of being vulnerable to spilling all his best hidden secrets without pause didn't play well with him. Still, if he didn't agree to this, he'd probably be dosed anyway, likely after getting stunned and bound in some way or another. He preferred to go the easy route, so he smiled.

"Certainly, professor. I assume you're referring to the truth potion?",

If Dumbledore was surprised at the immediate acceptance, he did not show it and instead moved towards the fireplace, threw some Floo powder in and called for Spinner's End.

* * *

It didn't take two seconds after laying his eyes on the two Harry Potters for Snape to adapt the trademark scowl and an annoyed look.

"I don't know what you're playing at or why you'd want to pretend to look like that dunderhead, but you should know that I don't particularly appreciate wasting my time or potions." he spat, before handing one of the two vials he brought with him to Dumbledore - one with transparent liquid.

"It's lovely to see you too, Professor Snape." replied Older Harry, amused despite the incoming questioning.

The man just glared and Dumbledore motioned for them all to sit. A minute later three drops of aforementioned fluid were put on Adult Potters' tongue and said man felt a dull sense overcoming him, something akin to the Imperius curse, minus the wonderful feeling of all your worries being removed. Instead, he felt that his only worry, the only thing that truly mattered right now was responding to the incoming questions truthfully and without hesitation. And so, the questions came.

\- "What is your full name?",

\- "Harry James Potter". His voice was dull and devoid of any emotions.

The two older wizards looked at each other, before Snape narrowed his eyes and extended the question.

\- "What was your full birth name?"

\- "Harry James Potter".

Snape snatched the Veritaserum that lay on Dumbledore's desk, and started examining it, while the headmaster asked more questions.

\- "What is your birth date?",

\- "31st of July of 1980",

\- "Who were your parents?",

\- "Lily Potter and James Potter"

Suddenly Snape put the potion back on the desk and pointed his wand at Younger Harry, who was so far watching the scene with interest, but flinched away from the weapon.

"Headmaster, clearly the actual impostor is here. Very clever, making us think the older person was the one disguised, while both of them are. Some kind of prank, I suppose?" - He directed those last words at Adult Harry, spitting the word "prank" like the vilest curse imaginable. As the Veritaserum was still in effect, he was forced to answer the half-question.

\- "No.",

\- "Then how do you explain your current appearance?" - the Potions master snapped. That question was a bit too broad.

\- "I appear to look like my father with my mothers' eyes. The hair is a family trait. The scar on my forehead..."

He was interrupted right then by Younger Harry shouting a question, apparently getting nervous from the wand that was still pointed at him and impatient from all the pointless talking.

\- "Are you me from the future?",

\- "As far as I know, yes."

"There. Happy?" He glared at his potions teacher, who lowered the wand looking bewildered. That was, however, a question, so...

"I don't really feel particularly happy or sad at the moment."

After that pointless remark, Dumbledore adapted his twinkly-eyed look. "Well, then. I suppose the day got much more interesting." He shot pointed look at the second vial, at which Snape nodded and administered the antidote to Veritaserum. After Older Harry shook off the last bits of the truth serum's effect, Dumbledore continued.

"What brings you here, then, Harry?"

And so the time traveller began his tale for the third time that day.


	4. Explanations? Oh, fine

Professor Dumbledore looked startled as the older Harry Potter's tale finished. Snape was trying to put on his best bored expression, but you could easily see the man was tense as well.

"Well, that is... rather unsettling" finally began the ancient headmaster, steepling his fingers. "It appears we severely underestimated the number of allies Voldemort managed to gather for the final battle".

"There's a bit more to it than that," - replied Harry - "Obviously, giving Voldemort what amounted to a free hand in Death Eater recruitment during my fifth year was pretty bad. But the biggest problem ended up being the fact that most of our allies during the Battle of Hogwarts were students. Students which all received abysmal training in defence." The Adult Potter wanted to also add something about impossible tasks given to teenagers by certain individuals, but decided to bring that up later. Dumbledore nodded, shot a look at his potions teacher, shook his head and continued after a moment.

"Before we get to thinking about how to prevent that outcome, let's discuss how you managed to make it here." This piqued older Harry's curiosity. Could Dumbledore know what he managed to screw up?

"Let me first address your concern about this being a, ah, as you put it, different universe, first..." The twinkling eyes returned, albeit so slightly. "That's correct and wrong at the same time." Harry blinked.

"How so, professor?"

"Well, let me tell you this, first; a couple years before you were born, the Order of Phoenix briefly considered using a ritual to bring someone from another reality into ours to help us deal with Voldemort."

Everyone, including Snape, gaped at that, even if he tried to hide it.

Dumbledore waved his hand. "Oh, nothing came out of it, don't worry. But, while thinking about it, we learned that while there is a lot of different rituals to summon someone, there's really only one to banish a person away..." That was true, Harry mused. The book he read contained ways to summon just about anybody... A hero, a friend, a mortal enemy... even a counterpart of someone you loved from another universe. There was distinctively no mention of sending those people back, however. As he was pondering this, Dumbledore continued.

"While sending someone away, you can't really set a destination, so the person just ends up in another, random universe, of which there's likely an infinite amount of. Thus, we wouldn't be able to bring the person we summoned home if he requested such." The headmaster smiled. "We considered it cruel to bring someone against their will here and force them to stay, so the idea was dropped."

Older Harry nodded. Indeed, being yanked across the multiverse by some vigilante group just to be asked for help in defeating a madman and offered no way back likely wouldn't sit well with most people. It actually seemed like an easy way to install another bitter dark lord in your reality.

"What's that got to do with anything?" - suddenly asked Younger Harry, who was now looking confused. Dumbledore turned to face him.

"Ah, well, you see... if we'd theorize that your older self mistakenly performed that banishing ritual on himself, it's extremely unlikely he'd actually end up in a universe as similar to his as this one seems to be. No, there's a far more likely scenario."

Both Harries' faces lit up in realization, before the time-traveller frowned.

"But then why did Mrs. Weasley stop the twins and Ron from getting me away from Surrey?"

"Ah, there's a very simple explanation for that," - Dumbledore smiled - "You see, your time-travelling endeavour likely ended up producing quite a bit of magical backlash. All it had to do was wake Molly up, who went to check on what was happening."

"But that was at night! I arrived in the morning!" said Harry, nonplussed by that answer. That was the moment Snape, who was quiet up to this point, decided to speak up.

"Potter, do you honestly think something like this was instantaneous on our end?" - he spat - "No, magic was likely leaking for hours before you were finally brought here."

Dumbledore nodded gravely. "I must say you're also extremely lucky you ended up near a magical establishment where the backlash was somewhat hidden. If you landed in some muggle area, you'd likely have the ministry and the unspeakables ready to arrest and interview you the second you appeared." Harry shuddered at that thought. He'd probably be leaking Veritaserum through his pores by now if that were to happen.

Snape spoke up again.

"Still, I don't find it that likely this dunderhead managed to do the impossible and travel so far back..."

"Ah, my boy, I'm not so sure it's that impossible." - replied Dumbledore, twinkling eyes in full blast by now.

"Headmaster, the ministry has tried for centuries..." - bristled Snape,

"...to hide the fact that this is, in fact, easily doable."

Snape's eyes widened and Older Harry gasped.

"You mean..."

"Yes, Harry, time-travel is not a novel concept to wizards by any stretch of the imagination. However, it tends to be rather abused, so the ministries around the world have been trying to stop any progress in that field and destroy any texts that contain instructions on how to perform the jump." - Dumbledore smiled again - "In fact, Time-Turners exist just so that appearances can be kept that _something_ is being done in the field - the unspeakables "manage" to make them go back an hour more every couple decades or so - while keeping that branch of magic closely monitored."

"How do you know about this, then, professor?" - asked Older Harry and it was his younger self responding this time.

"It's probably because of all the titles he has!" - he exclaimed happily - "Someone like the Chief Warlock of Wizegamet would be in on all the secrets!"

Snape rolled his eyes and Dumbledore chuckled. "That's 'Wizengamot', Harry. But yes, you're quite right. I am, indeed, as you put it, in on... well, _almost_ all the secrets."

Harry conceded that point, but there was still one thing off.

"Well, alright, but that's not what the ritual I performed was labelled as."

"Ah. I have a feeling that's why that text wasn't destroyed in the secret purge of such lectures centuries ago. Someone - either the author of the tome or the owner - likely learned what was happening and purposefully mislabelled it to preserve the book."

"But the ritual still had something to do with time travel..."

"Ah, yes. But a ritual like you described would unfortunately be quite useless, so it was ignored."

Older Harry stared. "Useless? Why?"

"Well, let me ask you something. What did you expect would happen if you did manage to send just your memories back in time?" - asked the headmaster, with a suppressed smirk.

"I already told you; my younger self would visit you and..." - Adult Harry started explaining, just to be stopped by an impatient wave of Dumbledore's hand.

"Yes, yes, quite, but I was referring to your side? You send a copy of your memories back into the past, so what happens to YOU now?"

The time-traveller blinked. He hadn't really considered that, but...

"Well, I imagine, uh, that, er, reality would change right then and there and it'd become what my younger self achieved?" Snape let out an annoyed huff, while Dumbledore just smiled again.

"That's not how the whole affair with time-travel works. Which brings me nicely to my second point - how you are technically not in an alternate universe, and still, in a way, you are. You see, when you do something like this, be it using a Time-Turner or a ritual like yourself - you create a fork in the timeline."

"A fork...?"

"Yes. Indeed. The timeline has split, and this one is now hopefully heading somewhere far different than the one you left. The way you described would only create a heap of paradoxes. Here's a question to prove it: if time-travelling worked linearly like you assumed, you'd right now remember yourself being taken from the Dursleys by yourself during this summer. Do you, Harry?"

Older Harry frowned and started to think. He still vividly recalled being rescued by the Weasley twins and Ron using the flying Ford Anglia. The only memories of the other scenario were from the adult point of view. A look of realization overtook his face and Dumbledore clapped.

"Very well. Naturally, I expect this information to be secret. Either way, now that we explained that conundrum, I daresay we should discuss how to proceed from here..."

* * *

"W-well..." - started Older Harry, now unsure of how to lay all of his knowledge out and not miss anything important. "I suppose the biggest concern right now is the reason why Voldemort is still alive..."

"Ah, yes" - nodded Dumbledore - "I've had my suspicions for years, but it'll be nice to have them either proven or disproven. Well, do go on..."

"Wait, why is him being alive so strange?" - asked Younger Harry and his older counterpart turned to face him.

"Well... the night Voldemort decided to play tennis using our forehead and the killing curse, the curse rebounded and hit him, right?" Older Harry looked around and shrugged. "That curse is supposed to kill, not leave you as a bodiless spirit. No exceptions. We lived because of our mother's sacrifice, as you know. But Voldemort didn't have it, so he should be completely and totally gone."

"Yet, as the encounter with Quirrel last month proves, he's not." concluded Snape, who was starting to get impatient by the looks of things. "So how did he manage this feat?"

"Horcruxes." - said Older Harry simply and Dumbledore sagged. There was no response from Younger Harry, as expected, but even Snape seemingly had no idea what those things were. He turned to Dumbledore. "I take it that's what you were expecting?"

"Yes, it was one of the possibilities... "

"And what are Horcruxes?" - inquired Snape and Older Harry quickly started explaining the concept.

"Containers for pieces of a soul. You rip yours apart through cold-blooded murder and lock the piece that split into an obj... into, er, something. Since there's now a piece of your soul that's not tied to your physical body, you... can't die."

Snape paled at this. "He's... immortal?" That particular sentence was uttered at the same time by both him and Younger Harry. Dumbledore sighed.

"Yes. We have to find it and destroy it. There's thankfully several ways that work."

" _It_? Professor, I specifically said _'Horcruxes'_. As in, plural" - corrected Older Harry and Dumbledore balked. "Sure, no one ever attempted to split their soul multiple times before, but Voldemort's a rather special wizard, isn't he?"

"How many?"

"We had to destroy seven," - Harry ignored the horrified look on the headmaster's face - "However, right now, there's only six of them." Dumbledore sighed, but then looked up.

"You know where they are, however, correct?" - he said with hope in his voice. Older Harry just smiled and nodded.

"Yep. In fact, two of them are in this very castle at the moment." That revelation stunned everyone, until Snape demanded they collect them immediately.

That was when Older Harry realized this was the moment. He knew very well one of the Horcruxes was sitting right next to him, looking at him expectantly. Fortunately, combing through the Black Library had brought yet another pleasant find.

The information Hermione found in _Secrets of the Darkest Art_ detailing how to destroy a Horcrux was mostly accurate. The only way to do so is to damage said Horcrux in a way it was unrepairable by any magical means. For a living being that would be dying.

Harry, just like Dumbledore, found no alternative for destroying the Horcrux in his scar - he had to let himself get killed. That was, however, when he realized that they both approached the issue from the wrong angle.

After all, a supposed Horcrux-making Dark Lord might one day of his eternal life decide to change the vessel it was stored in. Perhaps as a means of strengthening the defences - or maybe because he got bored of the trinket. Whichever it was, a spell to move a Horcrux to another container existed. He could move the one from his younger selves' scar to some other object and destroy that instead, with no danger posed to the smaller Harry.

If he hadn't found this spell early on, he might have disregarded the whole time-travelling experiment entirely. When he was told he was housing a piece of Voldemort and the only way to get rid of it was to die, he immediately rushed out into the forest the Dark Lord invited him to get killed in and promptly allowed said individual to do so. He didn't know how his younger self would react to such news.

Even with the Horcrux-moving spell, he thought very long about whether his past self would be able to cope with having the Dark Lord's soul stuck in him for almost all his life. He could easily panic and do something stupid. Still, this was the only way. Hopefully it would be over quickly enough, and now he was at least there to fully and slowly explain everything, without the news hitting all at once.

"Well, we originally took care of this Horcrux at the very end..." he started, thinking of the best way to phrase this. He turned to his younger self.

"Harry, do you remember how your scar used to hurt whenever Quirrel was near you?" The inquiry was posed naturally, but Older Harry noticed Dumbledore already started to observe the conversation with trepidation. That man was really quick on the uptake. Harry Jr. just looked on confused.

"Well, on that Halloween night Voldemort was reduced to a ghost... he had already split his soul multiple times, as I've already said. That rendered it especially unstable..." He took a deep breath and continued. "...so when came to our house, even though he didn't wish for it, a piece of his soul happened to split when he fired that killing curse at us."

Right then Older Harry was sure everyone in the room started catching on, so he decided to get to the point quickly.

"Anyway, basically, there was no object prepared to be a Horcrux to latch onto in the vicinity, so it attached itself to the only living thing in that building left... us."

There. He said it. As expected, his younger counterpart didn't take the news well. In fact, no one took the news well. The boy immediately shrunk upon himself, folded his arms and dug deeper into the squishy armchair he was sitting in. Dumbledore paled, while Snape just froze. Before they all started panicking, he moved on...

"But, there is some good news. It's possible to remove it." He tried to smile reassuringly, but it probably didn't work. He still had horrified green eyes pointed at him, and the boy's breathing quickened. "Look, I had the thing removed and I'm completely fine, yeah?" He added quickly, noting not to mention the exact way _he_ had the Horcrux removed right now.

The other two visibly relaxed upon hearing that comment and Dumbledore looked intrigued. Snape removed a vial out of his robe, uncorked it and gave it to Younger Harry.

"W-w-what?" was squeaked out.

"Calming draught. Drink it, Mr. Potter, there's no need for us to have you go through a panic attack right now." The comment, while still fairly snarky, lacked the usual malice used when conversing with the spawn of his school nemesis. Older Harry subtly inclined his head towards the potions master for quick thinking and coaxed his younger self into taking the concoction. After several moments, the breathing slowed down to a reasonable pace. That was when Dumbledore stepped in to appease his curiosity.

"But, Harry, in all of the books I read on the subject, the only way to get rid of a Horcrux was to destroy the vessel it was in... And destroying a living vessel would involve..." - the last part was left unspoken, but it was clear what he meant. Older Harry inwardly cursed the old fool and hoped his younger counterpart wouldn't start to hyperventilate all over again.

"Yes. That is the only way. But, as Hermione once said... _'A lot of greatest of wizards don't have an ounce of logic'_. All we have to do first is to move the Horcrux to another container and then destroy that. No need to harm anyone."

Dumbledore looked stunned, but Harry guessed the wrong reason.

"Well, yes, obviously, but... you mean you found a spell that can accomplish this?!"

Ah. Whoops. So the old man did just now consider this, then. Harry started to ponder whether that meant he couldn't find a book containing this information last time or that he was getting senile as the years went on. Probably the former, he mused. It would be just like the darkest family in Britain to have the only copy of such a tome holed up somewhere in their house. That was when he heard his younger self squeak out again.

"C-can we do it now? Please?" Ah. Good. It looked like the boy was past the initial panic, probably thanks to that calming draught and already down to determination to see the blasted thing gone.

"Certainly." Older Harry quickly recalled the steps he found in the book. "Well, first, I need something to transfer the soul piece to." He looked around and spotted a handkerchief the headmaster was just using for his meal. Grinning, he picked it up. It'd soak up the basilisk venom nicely.

"Potter, what are you about to do?" asked Snape, clearly not quite trusting the time-traveller with the process. So, Harry began to explain.

"Basically, I need to set this up," - he waved the piece of cloth around - "like one would a real Horcrux. It's dark magic, true, however I think there's a rather good cause for it." Dumbledore seemed unsure for a moment, but eventually seemed to acknowledge the point. "I know how to do it, because I memorised it before I tried to send my memories back in time."

"Wi-will it hurt?" - asked his younger self apprehensively. Older Harry sighed.

"I... don't know, to be honest." The book didn't describe this, it only assured the user that the process would not destroy the vessel nor any inherent magic of the object. "Your scar will probably burn. The process shouldn't take more than a couple minutes, though, so hopefully it won't be that bad." Younger Harry shuddered, but looked up and said, determined;

"Okay. Do it."

So, the time-traveller laid the handkerchief in the middle of the room, while the three other wizards watched. He got out his wand, pointed it and uttered the first spell.

 _"Viventium simulare!"_

A dark brown beam shot out and connected with the piece of cloth. It scrunched up a little bit before turning limp again. What this spell was supposed to do was fool a piece of soul into thinking the object was alive, and thus give it incentive to latch onto it. Harry moved his wand in a complicated pattern next and muttered the second incantation.

 _"Receptaculum_ _inaversibilis_ _!"_

This spell gave the object all the properties of a Horcrux. There was now a nearly-indestructible piece of linen on the floor. However, if the process wasn't completed soon, the spell would destroy the object by itself, unable to hold it up in such a state all alone. Without this enchantment, the soul piece would be able to flee the object and probably attach itself to Younger Harry again. Another spell joined it soon afterwards.

 _"Adficio vicinia!"_

This made the object take ambient magic and use it to hold up the two previous spells in place. It's also why Horcruxes affected the magic of those who used or wore them - they were being actively used as fuel for the trinket.

"Alright, Harry, come here and sit near the handkerchief". His younger self shakily complied and soon Adult Harry was pointing at his scar. He breathed in loudly and after another complex wand motion uttered the last spell on the mental list.

 _"Motus aliena anima!"_

The effect was instantaneous. A black wisp of smoke came out of the scar and attached itself to Harry's wand. He slowly started to guide it towards the handkerchief on the floor. The smoke seemed to stretch itself like some sort of gassy rubber band. Eventually, the wand made contact with the proto-horcrux piece of fabric, his younger self screamed and was about to reach up to his scar, when the black mist detached itself from the twelve-year old's head with an audible _snap_ and rushed into the linen cloth. Said turned completely black for a moment, before returning to its regular, innocent appearance.

It was done. A moment later, the four wizards were left staring at the Dark Lord's new and not-very-improved Horcrux.

"Anyone wanna blow their nose on that?" - Asked Adult Harry, but the joke fell flat.

* * *

[ **Author's note** : Thank you for all the reviews. A bit of an exposition chapter today, but I promise we'll get into action next time. There's a couple of nods to other fanfics out there. Give yourself a cookie if you recognize them.]


	5. I suppose we better do that, then

The younger Harry was still shaking slightly from the Horcrux removal ordeal, while Dumbledore was poking the handkerchief with his wand, looking intrigued.

"So... how do you feel?" asked the older Harry tentatively.

"Erm..." started his smaller self, "Pretty much the same." He shrugged, but suddenly lifted his head, "Are you sure it's all gone?"

"Pretty certain. I don't remember feeling any different when it was removed, either, so don't worry." He smiled warmly, which was shyly returned. That was when Snape decided to butt in.

"As touching as the moment is, care to inform us how to get rid of this thing for good, Potter?" - he sneered, looking at the cloth in disdain. Dumbledore stopped poking it with his wand and looked at the Harries curiously.

"Ah, well... You wouldn't happen to have any basilisk venom, would you?" - Adult Harry asked, smile turning sheepish. Snape scowled fiercely.

"Potter, this school can barely stay afloat financially. Do you know how much a drop of the stuff costs?"

Older Harry averted his gaze slightly, wondering why, if this was the case, the school didn't make use of the rotting carcass down in the Chamber of Secrets. He decided to think about it later.

"Can't we just burn it?" - asked his younger self, throwing a glance at Dumbledore's Floo outlet, in which a fire was crackling merrily. The time-traveller smiled sadly. The cloth did look innocently fragile compared to the flames, but he knew better.

"We could, but we'd have to use a rather dangerous curse to do it. It won't be damaged at all by regular fire. So, unless someone here is confident in his Fiendfyre..."

Snape seemed to consider this for a second, but shook his head. "I could likely control it, but any slip on my concentration and the whole school could go down in flames." Dumbledore didn't seem to be happy with that option either. Adult Harry got reminded of the horrible wail that came out of destroyed horcruxes, which was enough to startle just about anyone. Thus, he just sighed.

"Well, no matter. There's a rather large source of basilisk venom in the school anyway..." Snape widened his eyes and looked ready to strike that ridiculous motion down, when Dumbledore shushed him. "Unfortunately, getting to it will require slaying a twenty-meter-long snake, so that's going to cause some trouble". The others looked at him incredulously.

"I do wonder whether the information about rooster crowing being fatal to basilisks is true..." - he added in a conversational tone after a moment. Not getting one for his daring rescue mission was a pretty thick-headed move in retrospect, but both him and Ron were a bit shaken with Ginny being taken at that moment to remember that tidbit.

"Harry, could you perhaps share the entire story with us? I think failing to notice such a creature in school would be quite difficult..." - mused Dumbledore.

"Not if it's in the Chamber of Secrets." - calmly replied older Harry. The headmaster's face immediately took on a look of realization. The time-traveller was about to launch into an explanation of his second year, when he remembered something vital.

"Professor?" - he queried, looking at Dumbledore. "Have the school supply lists been sent out yet?"

The ancient wizard appeared rather surprised by the sudden non-sequitur, but replied after just a moment.

\- "No, as it happens, we're still waiting for our new defence professor's book list.",

\- "Oh?" - softly incanted Snape - "You found a new defence professor, then?",

\- "Yes! A sole applicant, but certainly with excellent qualifications - young Gilderoy Lockha..." - he was interrupted here by a loud groan from older Harry and a disbelieving scoff by Snape.

\- "Headmaster, surely you remember how incompetent that arrogant ponce was in school!" - the potions master asked heatedly - "And what's this about the 'sole applicant'? I do believe I recall sending you one as usual as well!"

"Now, now, Severus, I'm sure Professor Lockhart will do just fine..." Dumbledore seemed to completely ignore the latter comment.

"If I might interrupt, headmaster..." - butted in adult Harry - "That man is just one of the many reasons why the school had no chance of defending itself during our battle with Voldemort." He started glaring at the ancient wizard. "About the only thing we've learned from him is how to imitate the death of various dark creatures under Gilderoy Lockhart's wand."

Snape snorted, but Dumbledore seemed unconvinced.

"Well, I do agree he seemed kind of vain, but I'm sure if he was given clear instructions on what to teach..."

It was Harry's turn to snort.

"I doubt that..." Suddenly, he got an idea. "Ah, perhaps I should just show you? If I'm not mistaken, you should have a pensieve handy somewhere..."

Dumbledore nodded and scooted over to one of the cabinets. He took the aforementioned artefact out carefully, placed it on his desk and started retrieving his own memories from it.

Younger Harry was looking at the object curiously, so his older self, anticipating the rapidly incoming question, explained what it was.

"You can watch and move around someone else's memory using that. It's a rather neat device." The twelve-year old's eyes widened and he looked excited at the prospect of seeing glimpses of the future. Dumbledore eventually motioned older Harry to start placing his memories in the bowl. He got a sheepish look in response.

"Ah, er, you see... I've watched quite a few memories, but I've never learned how to take them out...",

"Interesting to know someone so incompetent could actually manage to best the Dark Lord. Really fills me with hope, that," - sneered Snape, just to be rewarded with a glare from both Harries. The headmaster moved in to instruct the time-traveller in the process of memory retrieval, which turned out to be a simple incantation whilst thinking of a particular memory. The four wizards soon landed in Lockhart's defence classroom.

"This is so cool!" - exclaimed the younger Potter, looking around. Snape just rolled his eyes and didn't comment, instead focusing on the teacher currently strutting about the front of the room, reciting the list of his supposed achievements, holding a copy of one of his books.

" _ **Me," he said, pointing at it and winking as well. "Gilderoy Lockhart, Order of Merlin, Third Class, Honorary Member of the Dark Force Defense League, and five-time winner of**_ _ **Witch Weekly's**_ _ **Most-Charming-Smile Award — but I don't talk about that. I didn't get rid of the Bandon Banshee by**_ _ **smiling**_ _ **at her!**_

Snape pinched the bridge of his nose. "Merlin, it's like James Potter times twenty!" - he exclaimed. Adult Harry and Dumbledore looked amused by the comparison, but the twelve-year old seemed slightly insulted. He sent a questioning gaze towards his older self.

"Our father did have a rather... big head. Don't worry about it." The boy and Snape both looked startled by the admission, but Harry just shushed them, as Lockhart started talking again.

" _ **I see you've all bought a complete set of my books — well done."**_

"He assigned the complete set of his drivel as textbooks?!" - thundered Snape. Dumbledore smiled slightly and shook his head. Snape continued in the same tone; "How on earth did the poorer families buy them?! They probably cost a fortune-" The Headmaster's smile slipped right there. Meanwhile, Lockhart finished boasting about his set of literary nonsense and handed out the quiz. Older Harry beckoned everyone else closer to inspect the paper the memory Harry was just starting to look through.

 _ **1\. What is Gilderoy Lockhart's favorite color**_ _ **?  
**_ _ **2\. What is Gilderoy Lockhart's secret ambition**_ _ **?  
**_ _ **3\. What, in your opinion, is Gilderoy Lockhart's**_ _ **greatest achievement to date**_ _ **?**_

"Oh dear" - muttered Dumbledore, while the younger Harry laughed out loud. Snape continued looking murderous. "Right then." - announced Adult Harry. Let's see an actual lesson now, shall we? The memory dissolved and another one began.

" _ **Freshly caught Cornish pixies.**_ **" (...)**

" _ **Right, then," Lockhart said loudly. "Let's see what you make of them!" And he opened the cage. It was pandemonium.**_ **(...)** _ **Within minutes, half the class was sheltering under desks and Neville was swinging from the iron chandelier in the ceiling.**_

"Well, at least it's more exciting than Quirrel's lessons" - mumbled younger Harry and his older self shook his head. "Unfortunately, this is the last lesson like that. He later just read us stories from his stupid books..."

" _ **Come on now — round them up, round them up, they're only pixies," Lockhart shouted. He rolled up his sleeves, brandished his wand, and bellowed, "**_ _ **Peskipiksi Pesternomi**_ _ **!" It had absolutely no effect.**_

\- "...That's not a spell." - said both Dumbledore and Snape.

\- "...Pesky Pixie Pester No Me?" - questioned younger Harry, raising his eyebrow, amused.

\- "Sounds like a spell Fred and George might've made up to prank Ron, doesn't it?" - the two Potters grinned at each other recounting that particular memory.

\- "Oh, and you think THAT'S bad? Let's see how he does in the duelling club." And so, the scene dissolved again to Snape and Lockhart facing each other with wands raised.

 _ **Both of them swung their wands above their heads and pointed them at their opponent; Snape cried: "**_ _ **Expelliarmus**_ _ **!" There was a dazzling flash of scarlet light and Lockhart was blasted off his feet. He flew backward off the stage, smashed into the wall, and slid down it to sprawl on the floor.**_

\- "Ah, slightly too much power, perhaps" - Dumbledore admonished the potions master,

\- "I can't say I blame him. It WAS very satisfying to see" - said older Harry, while Snape was smirking, seeing himself triumphant over the ponce.

\- "Anyway, all that might seem rather bad, but there's still the icing on the cake." The scene dissolved yet again. Memory-Harry and Lockhart were talking back and forth, arguing over the defence professor running away in the time of need.

 _" **After all that stuff you did in your books —"  
"Books can be misleading," said Lockhart delicately.  
"You wrote them!" Harry shouted. **_

_" **My dear boy," (...) "My books wouldn't have sold half as well if people didn't think** **I'd** **done all those things. (...)"**_

 _" **So you've just been taking credit for what a load of other people have done?" said Harry incredulously.(...)**_

 _ **"There was work involved. I had to track these people down. Ask them exactly how they managed to do what they did. Then I had to put a Memory Charm on them so they wouldn't remember doing it. If there's one thing I pride myself on, it's my Memory Charms."**_

The memory ended here and the four wizards were ejected out of the pensieve. Dumbledore and younger Harry looked dumbfounded, while Snape adapted a look of barely concealed glee.

"He's... he's a criminal?" - slowly said Dumbledore, with steel in his voice, one that usually wasn't there, as he sagged into his chair.

"Unfortunately, professor, you seemed to have a knack for hiring those for the defence position during my school years" - older Harry said, and quickly noticing how rude that sounded moved in to apologize, smiling sheepishly - "Sorry. It just seemed like every professor bar perhaps a couple ended up trying to harm me somehow. Lockhart tried to obliviate us after revealing the truth..."

"Well, headmaster..." - interrupted Snape - "Under these circumstances, I'm sure you'll agree that you cannot let that man teach here..." - he raised an eyebrow - "And, thus, that leaves one more applicant..."

Dumbledore nodded, but just looked at him sadly once again. "Severus, as much as I'd like to give you the defence position, as you well know, finding another potions master willing to work for a teacher's salary is quite unlikely..." There was suddenly a glint of something in his eyes and he looked over at older Harry.

\- "Are there any people you'd recommend for the position, perhaps?",

\- "There were a couple teachers that were competent enough. Remus Lupi..." - he started to reply, just to be interrupted by Snape.

\- "No! Not that mangy..."

\- "Severus! That's quite enough," - admonished Dumbledore, before turning back to the time-traveller - "Unfortunately, I did already try to invite Mr. Lupin for the position. He declines it every year. I can only wonder what eventually convinced him to accept..."

Harry had a pretty good idea what that could have been, but decided that knowledge was useless. Sirius Black illegally escaping Azkaban was something he'd rather prevent from happening this time. He decided the offer the next best person for the job, even if he never had a single lesson with the man.

\- "Ah, well, perhaps Alastor Moody then?" Dumbledore blinked.

\- "He's the current head of the auror office. I can't exactly ask him to come teach here." Harry's eyebrows shot up, but then he nodded in realization.

-"Ah. He's going to, er, retire in a year or so." The headmaster looked amused by this piece of trivia, while Snape muttered something that sounded like "good riddance".

\- "Unfortunately, those are the only two people I could recommend at the moment..."

\- "Ah, surely not, Mr. Potter." - Dumbledore shook his head, - "I do believe you're missing one individual." His eyes were twinkling, which somehow unsettled Harry.

\- "Er, who do you have in mind, professor?"

\- "Why, I seem to recall talking with a defeater of a certain Dark Lord... he'd surely be quite good for the job, wouldn't you agree?"

Both Harries blinked. They blinked again, and that was when Snape roared.

\- "Headmaster, you can't possibly be considering...!"

\- "And why ever not, Severus? You have to admit he has experience few can admit to having..."

\- "But, Professor!" - Harry finally shook out of his astonishment - "I can't exactly show myself so publicly, can I? If Voldemort got wind of the fact I'm some future version of Harry Potter..."

\- "Ah, but of course not. You'd have to work under a false name. Perhaps a slight disguise, as well."

\- "A false name?"

\- "Why, yes. You'll need one nevertheless, won't you? We could easily install you as some long lost Potter relative..."

\- "Easily install? How?"

Dumbledore looked thoughtful for a second.

"Why, we'd simply have to find some squib relative of yours that already passed away and then claim you're related to him. Any blood test would prove you're indeed related to the Potter family, if your looks didn't already tell the whole story." - there the twinkle intensified tenfold - "And it would make executing the plan of getting your younger self out of that Dursley home quite simpler, wouldn't it?"

\- "How do you..." - gasped older Harry, but the headmaster just chuckled,

\- "I wouldn't expect you to let yourself stay in that house."

\- "What do you mean?" - asked Snape suddenly - "Surely, Potter's relatives pamper him at every turn. Why would he not want to go back there?"

\- "Ah, Severus, if that is so, why did Molly Weasley just inform me of young Harry being starved this summer break?" The twelve-year old ducked his head and started blushing profusely once again.

\- "Ridiculous, that woman..." - started Snape,

\- "That woman is unfortunately quite right, professor..." - interrupted the adult Harry. He looked straight into the potion master's eyes. "A tin can of cold soup a day isn't enough to feed a boy and his owl..." Meanwhile, he was pondering this turn of events. It was certainly quite unexpected. He honestly thought Dumbledore would fight to teeth and nails to keep his younger self locked tightly behind the Privet Drive's blood wards. He suspected that Dumbledore already got the gist of his plans using Legilimency at some point. If he was going to allow him to go ahead with the whole deal this easily, he wasn't going to protest.

Snape spluttered, which was a rare thing for him to do and younger Harry finally butted in.

"I really wouldn't have to go back there? Where would I stay? The Weasleys?" - he asked, hope painted across his face.

"Unfortunately, as sure as I am the Weasleys would happily let you stay at their house, there is still the matter of sufficient protection..." said Dumbledore. "The wards set on the house in Surrey are the only thing that can prevent any of Voldemort's people to harm you..."

Ah yes. The blood wards finally step into the light. Fully expecting the headmaster to have already picked up his idea from his head and reminding himself to work on Occlumency the first opportunity he got, older Harry asked,

"But the wards can be moved, yes?"

"Obviously. When I set the wards up I was fully prepared for the possibility of the Dursleys moving..." - replied the headmaster - "the only thing that has to be fulfilled for the wards to work is that the owner of the property needs to be a blood relative of Lily Potter."

"Which means you could set the wards up at a house owned by me." - finished older Harry, and Dumbledore nodded. There was a short bout of silence, before...

"S-So I'd stay with you?" - asked the twelve-year old and seeing the time-traveller nod, he squeaked "...But wouldn't that be weird? I mean, you're technically me."

His older self lowered himself to look into his eyes. "Perhaps so. But not weirder than being taught by yourself, no?"

Dumbledore beamed. "Ah, so you've made up your mind?" Harry just smiled.

"Well, I did enjoy teaching that secret defence club in my fifth year..." It seems everything started to fall into place quite nicely. "Hopefully that jinx on the position won't get me." And if everything went according to plan, even if the jinx was actually real, the caster of it would be gone before it had a chance to trigger.

[ **Author's note** : The bolded parts were taked out of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets.]


	6. But first let's get settled in

Severus Snape was not really gratified with the concept of Boy-Who-Lived-turned-colleague, so he quickly excused himself and left for Spinner's End with the trademark scowl firmly in place. Harry, spotting his younger selves' fatigue sent him back to the Burrow. The boy definitely needed a good rest after the 'holiday' in the Dursley household.

This left only the Headmaster and older Harry slowly heading towards the Room of Requirement to retrieve the second readily-available Horcrux.

"I must say, dear boy, you seem to know the castle a bit better than most students that finish their education here..." - said Dumbledore as the two wizards ducked into a rather obscure secret shortcut leading to the seventh floor. Harry chuckled at this and making a mental note to retrieve the Marauder's Map from the twins, said:

"Well, I can't claim credit for finding all of these things, but I definitely do know my way around. Ah, here we are!" - he pointed at the tapestry of Barnabas the Barmy - "Very conveniently marked."

Dumbledore's eyes twinkled like mad in the dimly-lit corridor.

"He put one in here? That's highly arrogant, even for Tom..."

Harry was already walking back and forth along the wall, chanting _"I need to access the room of hidden things..."_ in his head. As the door appeared he turned around to face the headmaster.

"Say, if the school is in a such bad shape financially, why don't you sell or use the things from this room? I'm sure something valuable is in here..."

The two wizards entered the room and looked around.

"Yes, perhaps a good look around wouldn't hurt, however..." - here Dumbledore's gaze fell on a dilapidated broom that looked too fragile to sweep the floor with, let alone take into the skies - "I suspect that people which leave actually valuable things in here do remember to retrieve them back..."

"...But the room's hidden. People would leave things and then wouldn't be able to find the door again, no?" - Harry was actively looking around for the Horcrux now. Despite this being the third time he'd be looking for it, it was still rather hard to find in the piles upon piles of old, dusty stuff.

"Dear boy, they would remember the corridor they left their belonging well enough that they'd surely stroll around it more than a couple times. And since their missing item would be the first thing on their mind right then..."

"...the door would eventually appear." - finished Harry. Dumbledore smiled and nodded.

"Thus, I am afraid there isn't much in here aside from old and hopelessly broken things..." Dumbledore looked thoughtful for a second. "Harry, what are we actually looking for?"

The time traveller smiled sheepishly, as he forgot the headmaster would probably be able to help find the elusive object.

"Ravenclaw's diadem."

Dumbledore looked startled for a second and then smiled sadly. "What a shame. Such a priceless artefact..."

Harry returned the smile. "Indeed. This pile of trash isn't a fitting place for it, Horcrux or not." Suddenly, he got an idea and laughed, remembering the familiar quote from Hermione about the lack of logic in wizards. "What are we even doing?" He shook his head and started to head out of the room. Dumbledore followed with a curious look on his face. Once they were both out of the room, the door leading to it disappeared and the time-traveller started to walk back and forth along the wall once again.

"Why waste time looking around when we can just ask for it specifically..." - Harry muttered, and the entrance to the Room of Requirement reappeared shortly after. He motioned the headmaster toward it. The two wizards entered and were greeted with a much smaller room, with only one thing in it - a discoloured old tiara. There was a bout of silence as they took the sight of the item in. Finally, Harry spoke up.

"Well... there we go. This is the second Horcrux." - he picked up the soul container - "Good thing these weren't usually cursed further." An image of Dumbledore's shrivelled-up black hand shot through his mind for a second, before he dismissed it. The slight wince that momentarily adorned his face was not missed by the headmaster, however.

"Usually?"

The pent-up anger Harry has been suppressing suddenly flared up. Thoughtlessly putting on that ring was the height of stupidity! It caused Dumbledore to have to rely on teenagers to go onto that damned camping trip of doom and despair! It caused Hogwarts to become a twisted horror house of torture for non-purebloods! It probably partially caused all those deaths in the final battle, as having Dumbledore there would probably shift the balance a bit. Perhaps Voldemort wouldn't even dare to attack...

"Oh, just a Shrivelling Curse on one. We lost a certain headmaster due to its effects..." - he quipped, shooting a pointed glare. The ancient wizard looked taken aback, but didn't lose his composure.

"Oh my. I must have been very careless" - he responded calmly. Too calmly. Damn this old fool and his carefree attitude!

"Careless? More like idiotic! Do you even know what you caused?!" - Harry was shouting by now. He made for his wand, about to hex the damn codger into next century, when he accidentally dropped the Horcrux diadem. The stick of holly was almost on target, but then Harry noticed the anger quickly dissipating. Dumbledore was looking rather worried. Harry frowned and lowered the wand, then looked down at the fallen tiara on the floor. Oh. Of course. The time-traveller shuddered. That thing was much more powerful than the locket. Recalling the Horcrux-making theory, it made sense. While the locket was locked away for several years in an old, dilapidated house in a muggle neighbourhood, this thing had spent an eternity feasting on the ambient magic of Hogwarts from thousands of students, wards and magical objects.

"Okay, maybe picking them up isn't a good idea under any circumstances..." After swiftly apologizing to the headmaster, which the man simply waved off, he conjured up a wooden box and levitated the Horcrux in.

"Hopefully this will do for the time being but it'd be probably best to destroy it as soon as we can..." - Harry sighed - "...unfortunately, we cannot at the very moment."

* * *

"I see," - said Dumbledore with a thoughtful look on his face. Harry and the headmaster have returned from the Room of Requirement back into the latter's office and the time-traveller has just finished explaining why going after the basilisk right now wasn't a good idea.

Simply put - timing the Weasley's visit into Flourish and Blotts so that Lucius Malfoy gives Ginny the diary Horcrux again was going to be practically impossible. Too many factors played into that happening that day; Harry's visit to Knockturn Alley (which probably wouldn't happen now, since his younger self already succesfully used the floo), meeting the Grangers and Hagrid, getting spotted by Lockhart... if any of those didn't play out exactly as they did the first time, Malfoy would likely hand the diary to someone else - unless he was specifically looking for the Weasleys, which was rather unlikely.

With someone's else's hands on the diary, the basilisk would likely be released once again. There was no telling what the Horcrux would try to do if the basilisk wasn't actually in the Chamber of Secrets. Harry decided the known devil was better than the unknown devil - after all, catching the culprit before anything even happened would be pretty simple. He'd just have to vigilantly study the Marauder's Map around Halloween and see who was hanging out around Myrtle's bathroom.

"I must say I'm not entirely thrilled with the prospect of unleashing a basilisk onto the school, controlled environment or not" - the headmaster finally spoke up after a moment of thought.

"No, me neither" - said Harry - "I mean, I suppose we could try arranging things into going the same way as before... or I could try stalking Lucius Malfoy under the invisibility cloak that day... But it's still best to leave the beast alone for now in case it doesn't work out, isn't it?"

"Yes, that does seem like the smart course of action..." - mused Dumbledore - "Doesn't hurt to try to prevent it, however, as you said. Which means... you need to pick out the defence textbooks for your classes, so we can send the supply lists out at the right time" - he finished with a smile.

* * *

Soon after, Harry was headed towards the defence professor's quarters he was going to occupy. It was actually located in a rarely used wing of the castle, but the instructions gotten from the headmaster were rather precise. He soon got to a rather unremarkable portrait of a witch in an obscenely large wig and frilly dress.

"Err... I'd like to get into the defence professor rooms..." - Harry said after a second of staring at the witch, remembering that Dumbledore didn't actually give him a password.

The portrait's occupant glared and scoffed.

"Students don't get to visit! How'd you even figure out that they're here?!" - the witch replied in a posh accent. The freshly-made professor rolled his eyes.

\- "Look, I'm not a student. I was just hired for the defence job..."

\- "Oh, sure you were. Pull the other one. Heard that a million times already."

This made Harry sigh in exasperation and wonder if the portrait has indeed heard that line around that amount of times, seeing how there's a new professor every year. Well, oh well. No way was he wasting time arguing with some paint. He turned around, ready to go back to Dumbledore's office in order to get the password when the portrait started talking again, completely losing the posh accent.

\- "Awww. You're no fun."

Whirling around, Harry noticed a cheeky smirk appear on the witch's face.

\- "What?"

\- "Most of the new professors go to ridiculous lengths to get in."

Harry blinked a few times.

\- "Wait, so you know I'm not actually a student?"

\- "'Course. Gossip spreads from portrait to portrait really quickly, you know..."

\- "So you play this joke on every single new defence professor?"

\- "Why, yes! Some of the older professors get really mad when I call them students!" - the witch cackled and Harry rolled his eyes. What a great picture this was.

\- "The last one was especially hilarious, he started stuttering like crazy! I did it multiple times just for fun!"

The time-traveller did get slightly amused at the concept of Voldemort getting annoyed by being barred from accessing his rooms due to a crazed painting.

\- "Well, can I get in, then?"

\- "Sure. Just tell me the new password, hon."

Not feeling particularly creative, Harry picked the Marauder's Map revealing phrase and stepped through the hole behind the canvas when it finally swung forwards to let him in.

He was immediately violently assaulted by the stench of garlic, which made his eyes water. It appears Quirrel's personal belongings weren't yet cleared from the room. Cloves of garlic hung around the ceiling and Harry idly wondered if they were there just to keep the charade going in case some other teacher decided to visit Quirrel in his room, or if the man himself couldn't stand the smell wafting from Voldemort's face.

The first thing that caught the time-traveller's eye were various documents scattered around the room. Quickly scanning them, Harry deemed them to be lesson plans and some ungraded papers. Slightly disappointed, he supposed Quirrel couldn't really keep notes on his masters' evil plans, lest someone find them. He neatly arranged all the bits of parchments into a big pile to examine a bit closer later (the lesson plans COULD come in handy) and then made a beeline towards the window in order to let some fresh air in. He also started banishing the foul-smelling plant bulbs. When that, and several air-freshening charms didn't seem to have much of an effect on the stench, Harry decided it was time to call a house elf for help. The creature arrived holding its nose.

\- "Cans I help, Master Professor, sir?" - it squeaked muffledly.

\- "Ah, er, yes, I was wondering if you knew of a way to, er, clear the air a bit?"

The elf looked relieved at the prospect of finally stopping the room from reeking so much, but then frowned.

\- "Tilly can try, but it be taking a few days..."

Great. He'd get to spend the night breathing in fumes so strong they would likely be enough to rid of Britain's entire population of vampires. Harry sighed, but smiled pleasantly at the elf, as it seemed to be getting nervous.

\- "That's fine, Tilly, I don't mind." The elf immediately started working, seemingly casting it's own versions of air-freshening charms (which also did nothing). Having nothing to unpack yet, Harry elected to get out of the smelly room for the time being.

* * *

The fleeting images of fireplaces slowed down, he prepared to get out and... came barrelling out of the hearth. He tried to stop himself from falling over, but it was of no use this time. He barely managed to keep himself from kissing the Burrow's floor. A string of rather foul curses escaped his mouth.

"Language, Potter, language!"

Adult Harry quickly got up onto his feet and saw his younger self standing next to Ron, both with identical smirks on their faces after watching his ungraceful exit.

\- "Oh, shut up. It's not like you don't know any of those. Dudley took care of that." - he retorted, scowling, but blushing slightly.

\- "Why do you use the Floo anyway? Why not just apparate?" - asked the twelve-year old. Putting on his best Hermione impression, the time-traveller replied,

\- "Harry, you can't apparate in and out of Hogwarts, I read so in..."

\- " _...Hogwarts: a History._ " - the trio finished the sentence together and chuckled afterwards.

\- "That reminds me, I should write Hermione about everything!" - the younger Harry suddenly exclaimed. His older self didn't have any objections at first, but then remembered something.

\- "Oh, actually, it'd be best if you didn't mention me yet..."

\- "Why?"

\- "Well, it wouldn't be good if someone intercepted Hedwig, but there's actually something we're planning to set up..."

That was when Mrs. Weasley stepped into the room.

\- "Ah, Harry, I've heard that you made professor! Congratulations, dear!"

He chuckled.

"Yes, indeed. Just got back from checking out my rooms at the castle. I guess I'll be staying there for the time being..."

"Dear, if you'd like, you're always welcome to stay here, you know..." - she interrupted and the time-traveller briefly considered acquiescing to the offer, considering the state of the defence quarters, but decided the Burrow was full enough at the moment.

"Ah, no, thank you, I'm fine at Hogwarts, really." - he smiled, and then continued - "I'm actually here to tell you something, though... In a few days, you're going to get the supply lists from Hogwarts." - he paused until everyone nodded - "Please go to Diagon Alley on the same day, if possible. And once you get there, don't go into Flourish and Blotts until you meet up with Hermione, okay?"

Everyone looked confused, but Molly eventually replied,

\- "Certainly, that shouldn't be a problem at all. Why, though?"

\- "Ah, well, there's an occurrence we're trying to recreate from the original timeline..." - he stopped there and considered what he should tell them. - "I doubt it'll actually occur, seeing how the timing is crucial and that I don't remember too many details from that day, so I think it's best I let as much happen naturally as possible. I'm only mentioning Hermione because I know we initially got hung back for quite some time..."

That out of the way, Harry decided it was about time to get an old map of Hogwarts and one of its creators out of the Burrow.

* * *

[ **Author's note** : Really sorry about the slightly shorter chapter and longer wait this time. Not entirely happy with how this turned out, either, but there's a load of other projects that I really needed to get onto... and still need to be getting onto, as well.]


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